Bottom line: BOC Aviation’s stock will debut with a 5-10 percent gain when trading starts on Wednesday, while Lufax’s delay of its IPO plan looks prudent until China’s P2P lending sector settles down.
BOC Aviation set for strong debut
After running into some early minor turbulence, Asia’s second biggest IPO of the year is set to take off later this week in Hong Kong when aircraft leasing company BOC Aviation begins trading in what should be a relatively buoyant debut. But the ride to market is looking a bit rockier for Lufax, with reports that what could become the first IPO for a P2P lender is being delayed until next year. Lufax had earlier signaled it planned to make its listing this year, most likely in Hong Kong or Shanghai. But its plan is being delayed as Beijing moves to clean up the nation’s unruly P2P lending market. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Tencent’s new disclosure that it processes more than 500 million daily mobile financial transactions highlights its rapid growth in the space, pushing market leader Alipay to accelerate its own expansion into Asia.
WeChat wallet creeps up on Alipay
It’s rare to see Internet giant Tencent’s (HKEx: 700) tech-savvy but reclusive chief Pony Ma do interviews or make public appearances, so when he does it’s always reason to take notice. In this case Ma has disclosed new figures that show just how rapidly Tencent is moving into the mobile financial transactions business, rapidly encroaching on an area previously dominated by Alibaba (NYSE: BABA) affiliate Alipay. A separate headline also reflects to some extent the pressure that Alipay is feeling, with reports that its parent Ant Financial is accelerating its recent move into several major Asian markets. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Shanda’s purchase of 12 percent of LendingClub reflects its new investment focus on global financial services, while Tencent’s pursuit of a major Finnish game maker is consistent with its previous M&A strategy.
Tencent eyes Finland’s Supercell
Major outbound M&A deals involving 2 of China’s largest private firms are in the headlines today, with new moves by private equity investor Shanda and Internet giant Tencent (HKEx: 700) reflecting their latest buying priorities. The first deal has Shanda buying a large stake in LendingClub (NYSE: LC), the peer-to-peer (P2P) US lending pioneer whose shares have tumbled recently due to a scandal involving some of its loans. The other headline has Tencent looking to take control of Finnish game maker Supercell, in a deal that would be its biggest acquisition of all time valued at several billion dollars. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Tiger Brokers could see strong growth by banking on Chinese demand for US and Hong Kong stocks, but also faces some risk if Beijing decides to regulate the company as a financial firm.
Tiger Brokers eyes Chinese with appetite for US, HK stocks
I’m kicking off my new series on noteworthy venture-backed companies with the fast-growing Tiger Brokers, which is feeding off a Chinese love of stocks and growing demand for access to overseas markets. In the current climate where China’s own stock markets have become quite volatile and prone to big sell-offs, Tiger’s gateway to the US and Hong Kong stock markets could prove a potent draw to Chinese traders looking to diversify their portfolios with international stocks from more mature markets.
In a small but highly symbolic footnote to this story, Tiger is also finally giving Chinese investors access to many of China’s hottest companies that are traded overseas, including the Internet “big 3” of Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU), Alibaba (NYSE: BABA) and Tencent (HKEx: 700). That could ultimately provide some upside for many of those stocks over the longer term, since Chinese investors are likely to boost trading volumes for many of these homegrown companies whose shares previously languished due to lack of familiarity among western investors. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: UnionPay’s move into the dollar-denominated US credit card market looks smart strategically, but is likely to fail due to clumsy execution and fierce competition from Visa and MasterCard.
UnionPay issues first US credit cards
Watch out, Visa (NYSE: V) and MasterCard (NYSE: MA). China’s UnionPay is taking on this global pair of credit card giants on their home turf, with word that the Chinese company will launch its first US-based card in partnership with ICBC (NYSE: 1398; Shanghai: 601398), China’s biggest bank.
Of course I’m being just a bit facetious here, since UnionPay’s first-ever US credit card will have to overcome huge obstacles to ever become a serious rival to local cards from Visa, MasterCard or American Express (NYSE: AXP). But I have to at least commend UnionPay for taking the offensive, since it’s likely to face a major assault on its own home turf later this year when Beijing finally opens the Chinese credit card market to foreigners. Read Full Post…
Anyone who has followed this series on my favorite Chinese stocks knows that all of my picks so far have come from the private sector, and that I’m generally not a fan of big state-owned enterprises (SOEs). But given the huge weight that SOEs carry in China’s economy and their preferential status in many key sectors, I feel obliged to recommend at least one such company in this series.
With that background in mind, my top pick among this group is the Hong Kong-listed Citic Ltd (HKEx: 267), one of China’s oldest conglomerates and a company often considered one of the nation’s most entrepreneurial SOEs. I particularly like Citic for its financial services focus, which includes its private equity arm, a bank and China’s leading brokerage, all of which are more commercially driven than many of China’s other big financial companies. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Alibaba’s new cloud tie-up shows that Korea is a primary market for its global expansion, while the new $4.5 billion funding for its Ant Financial affiliate could be followed by an IPO within the next 12 months.
Alibaba in Korea cloud initiative
E-commerce giant Alibaba (NYSE: BABA) is in a couple of major headlines today, led by word that its Ant Financial affiliate has just raised a whopping $4.5 billion in only its second-ever funding round. That particular story has been rippling through the headlines for a few weeks now, and is most notable because the deal is finally done and is triple the company’s original fund-raising target.
The other headline has Alibaba itself in a new deal to launch cloud computing services in South Korea, working in a partnership with a unit of local telecoms giant SK Telecom (Seoul: 017670). This particular deal is interesting because it represents Alibaba’s recent search for global growth stories, in a bid to satisfy investors worried about a slowdown in its home China market. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Ant Financial could raise more than $22 billion in a 2017 IPO if China’s Internet bubble remains intact for the next year, though there’s a 50-50 chance that bubble will burst and the company’s value will stagnate or even come down.
Ant Financial targets massive dual listing
Just a week after reports emerged that it was nearing one the biggest fundings of all time by a private Chinese company, a new report is saying that Alibaba-affiliated (NYSE: BABA) Ant Financial is on the cusp of formally closing a massive capital raising of more than $3.5 billion. Flush with all that cash from only its second funding round, the company is looking quite confident and saying it hopes to make the biggest IPO of all time on a Chinese domestic stock exchange.
Specifically, the latest report in the influential China Business Network says Ant hopes to eclipse the current record held by the 2010 IPO from Agricultural Bank of China (HKEx: 1288; Shanghai: 601288), one of China’s big 4 state-run lenders. Ant’s offering could come as soon as next year in a dual listing in China and Hong Kong, following the surprise disclosure that Ant would meet the strict profitability requirements for such a listing . Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Massive new fund raising by Ant Financial and Didi Kuaidi show there’s still lots of money looking to invest in emerging Chinese industries, though current valuations are overblown and likely to stagnate as China’s economy slows.
Ant Financial raises $3.5 bln
Every time I write that new funding seems to be cooling for Chinese tech companies, new reports emerge of yet another mega-funding. Two such new fund-raisings are in the headlines as the new week begins, led by a massive $3.5 billion new round for Alibaba-affiliated (NYSE: BABA) Ant Financial. The other mega-deal has homegrown car services provider Didi Kuaidi poised to raise $1.5 billion or more in new funding, as it vows to outspend an equally aggressive Uber for supremacy in the China market.
These 2 fundings show there’s still plenty of money chasing hot deals in China’s emerging industries, many in the tech and financial sectors. Two of my younger friends here have left more traditional media jobs over the last year to join the crowded field of private equity firms that are funding many of these deals, allowing hot companies like Didi Kuaidi and Ant to easily meet their targets and achieve very high valuations in the process. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Weak debuts for 2 China bank IPOs in Hong Kong and anemic profit growth for ICBC and Bank of China reflect the industry’s building bad loan problem, which could erupt into a full-blown crisis by the end of this year.
The headlines are littered with negative stories about Chinese banks as we reach the climax of the latest earnings season, reflecting the dismal outlook for this group of lenders staring at a major bad loan crisis. Often I like to be contrarian in this kind of situation and say it could represent a good buying opportunity, since Chinese bank stocks now trade at very low price to earnings (PE) multiples. But in this case I really do think far worse is still to come before the building crisis subsides, meaning there’s still plenty of downside for these stocks.
The bleak outlook was reflected by new Hong Kong IPOs for 2 local commercial lenders, whose shares both priced near the bottom of their range and ended flat on their first trading day. At the same time, 2 of China’s top 4 banks, ICBC (HKEx; 1398; Shanghai: 601398) and Bank of China (HKEx: 3988; Shanghai: 601398), both posted their latest quarterly results that continued to show their profits were sapped by growing bad debt. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Starwood’s board is likely to reject a new raised offer for the company from Anbang and keep its recommendation to accept a lower bid from Marriott, which offers more certainty of closing a deal and also better long-term prospects.
Anbang ups the ante in Starwood bidding war
The latest development in the bidding war for US hotelier Starwood (NYSE: HOT) looks both expected and unexpected, with word that Chinese suitor Anbang has upped its offer to top the most recent bid from rival Marriott (NYSE: MAR). I say the move looks expected based on my previous assessment that Anbang looked determined to buy Starwood at any price. But the new bid is also a bit unexpected because Chinese media reported last week that the nation’s insurance regulator was likely to veto such a deal, which seemed to show Anbang might drop its pursuit of the purchase that is now valued at $14 billion.
The latest developments also include a response from Marriott, which seems to be saying “enough already”. That would indicate Marriott doesn’t plan to raise its latest bid, which is about 6 percent lower than the new one from Anbang, and instead let Starwood’s board decide which offer to recommend. Read Full Post…
